Nine Lives

by Sharon Sala

  Mark Presley was a self-made man. He’d grown up in a rural community in southwest Texas, the only child of a blue collar family. His father had been a mechanic, his mother a beautician. He’d had a normal childhood up until his senior year of high school.

  The end of phase one of his life began on homecoming day at the local high school. Besides a parade and a pep rally before the big game that night, the chamber of commerce had sponsored a city-wide barbecue. Mark, being the starting quarterback for the local football team, was one of the honorees who would be riding the school float in the parade. Two hours before the parade, his daddy had dropped dead at work from a heart attack.

  Mark missed the parade. He missed the big homecoming game. He missed graduation. He missed the athletic scholarship he’d been counting on. And the day he realized all his dreams were as out of reach as his father, he made a promise to himself that he would never miss out on anything again.

  When his girlfriend realized his status wasn’t as shiny as it had been, she slowly drifted away. After that, it was anger and disappointment that fueled his drive to succeed.

  He’d gone to work at the local auto parts store, sweeping up and making deliveries. By the age of twenty-one, he was head of the parts department. By twenty-five, he’d married the daughter of his boss, who also owned a large farm implement company. When his father-in-law passed away six years later, Mark was named president of the company. He’d taken it from a profitable business to one with worldwide recognition.

  He cheated on his wife on a regular basis, as did most of the men in his social circle. Power was a big turn-on for pretty girls wanting a free ride, but he made sure his wife never wanted for a thing, including his attention. That was his safety net, because he had vowed he was never getting caught.

  He’d known Marsha, his personal assistant, had a thing for him. He’d known it for years, but he’d never made a practice of playing where he worked. Then, about four months ago, in a moment of weakness, he’d broken his own rule and, for a while, thought it would all work out. Marsha was a beautiful woman and smart as they came. It had been a refreshing change to be with someone who was his mental equal, only she’d gotten all crazy, talking about love and babies. He’d tried to give her money for an abortion. She threw it in his face and made an appointment with an obstetrician instead.

  He’d had her followed. He knew she was seeing an OBGYN on a regular basis. It was at that point that he’d known he would have to take a different tack with her. He couldn’t have her showing up nine months later with a kid bearing his DNA. In spite of the aggravation, he wasn’t all that concerned. It was just another hitch in his world that needed to be smoothed out.

  Presley was in the middle of a transatlantic conference call when his cell phone rang. He glanced at the caller ID and silently cursed. As soon as he could, he ended his call and called Marsha.

  The fact that Mark hadn’t answered had been upsetting for Marsha, but not unexpected. She was leaving the parking lot of the doctor’s building when her cell phone rang. When she realized it was Mark, she was elated. He’d been so cold when he’d fired her, but now he was calling her back. Surely this was a good sign. She parked in the first empty space she could find and reached for her phone.

  “Mark! I knew you would call.”

  Mark was so angry he was shaking, but he wasn’t going to alert her that all was not right in his world.

  “What did you want?” he asked.

  “To talk to you…but not to make any demands. Please, you have to believe me.”

  “I’m not leaving my wife.”

  “I don’t want you to. I’ve accepted what I meant to you, but I was hoping you’d take our child into consideration. You know my background. You know how hard it is for a child to grow up without parents.”

  “The kid will have you.”

  “Every child deserves both parents,” Marsha said. “Won’t you at least meet with me to talk? Just to talk? I’m not making demands. I just want you to think of the child.”

  “I’ll meet with you,” Mark said. “But no promises.”

  Marsha’s joy surged. “Oh, Mark…darling…thank you, thank you. I promise you won’t be sorry.”

  “Penny and I are leaving in a couple of days for Christmas vacation. If you want to talk, it will have to be today.”

  It was all Marsha could do not to giggle. He was going to see it her way after all.

  “That’s fine. Just name the time and place,” she said.

  Mark smiled to himself. She was playing into his hands, just as he’d planned.

  “I’m on my way to the airport, so my time is short.”

  “Are you going to the company airport?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll be there within the hour.”

  “I’ll be waiting,” Mark said. He’d already given the airport employees their Christmas bonuses, and they’d scattered to the four winds. He would have the place to himself.

  He walked out of his office, told his secretary he wouldn’t be back until morning and left. It was nothing he hadn’t done a thousand times before. Within thirty minutes he was at his private airport.

  He put on an old pair of coveralls he got out of an employee locker, took a baseball cap from a hook inside the office and gave the company helicopter a flight check, then sat down to wait for Marsha.

  He didn’t have to wait long.

  When he saw her car turn off the main road and onto the property, a knot formed in his belly. Then he reminded himself that he could do this—he had to. She’d given him no choice.

  When she pulled up beside his car and parked, he swallowed once, then stood up and put on the work gloves that had been in the pocket of the coveralls.

  Through a dusty window, he saw her get out and pause beside the car door. It was cold but sunny, and he noticed how pretty she looked. How odd that he would notice that today, when he was about to end her life. Marsha was stunning, but she was also a death sentence for him. If one of them had to go, it wasn’t going to be him.

  Marsha’s heart was thumping erratically as she got out of the car, but she was filled with hope as she wrapped her red coat more tightly around herself to cut the cold. She’d been out to the company hangar plenty of times over the last few years, so even though the place appeared deserted except for his car, she felt no hesitation in going inside.

  Once inside, she paused, allowing time for her eyes to adjust to the dimness. When she saw the office door open and a man in coveralls step out, she assumed it was one of the employees.

  “Hi, it’s me, Marsha. I’m meeting Mr. Presley. Is he in the office?”

  The man just raised his arm and waved as he continued toward her.

  It took a few moments for Marsha to realize that the man in the coveralls was Mark.

  “Mark?”

  “Yes, it’s me.”

  She thought no more of the odd clothing as she started to talk.

  “Thank you for meeting me like this,” she said.

  “Don’t mention it,” Mark said, and pulled a large wrench out of the carpenter’s loop on the side of the coveralls. Without hesitation, he drew his arm back and hit her.

  It was so unexpected and so fast that Marsha never realized what was happening until it was too late.

  She went down like a rock.

  Mark saw the deep indentation in the side of her head, as well as the blood beginning to seep from the wound. He grabbed a greasy rag from his pocket and clamped it on top of the blood as he picked her up in his arms. Without looking at her face, he carried her to the open door of the helicopter. There was a large sheet of blue plastic on the floor behind the pilot’s seat. He laid her on it and then rolled her up.

  He drove her car inside the hangar to hide it, then got in the chopper, checked to make sure that he’d loaded what he would need for later and revved up the engine. There was no flight plan to where he was going, but it didn’t matter. He knew the way by heart.

  Marsha f
loated in and out of consciousness several times, and each time she came to, she found it difficult to breathe and impossible to move. She tried to call out, but her lips wouldn’t open. There was something wet and sticky on her face and an indescribable pain in her head. She could hear a loud roar, and she could feel a sense of motion.

  Fear was swallowing her so fast that she couldn’t keep herself focused. She knew she was hurt. She knew Mark had done it. She also knew that he meant to kill her.

  Anger swept through her, knowing he was going to get away with it. She’d been so damned vague about her personal business with Cat. If only she’d called her and told her where she was going. At least Cat would have had a starting place from which to find her body.

  At last Marsha’s focus began to waver. She knew she was going to pass out again—this time, maybe for good—and she couldn’t let Mark Presley get away with her murder.

  But what could she do? Surely there was something….

  Suddenly she remembered her cell phone. It was in her coat pocket. If only she could reach it.

  Her fingers felt numb as she tried to move her arms. Whatever Mark had rolled her up in was so tight she could barely breathe, let alone move. Still, she had to try.

  Slowly she managed to ease onto one side just enough to give herself room to maneuver. As she did, her arm slid downward, almost of its own accord. She tried not to panic and focused on the baby she was carrying, knowing that the child deserved justice, even if she did not. It was her own foolishness that had gotten her into this mess. It broke her heart to know that her baby’s life was going to be over before it had a chance to begin.

  Again and again, she tried to find the opening of her coat pocket, but with no success. Just as she was on the point of giving up, her fingers slid into the void. The contours of the phone were so familiar. She slid her fingernail between the flip-top and bottom, then pushed upward, revealing the tiny buttons beneath.

  Her hands were shaking horribly as she tried to picture the numbers on the keys. Finally she punched in the numbers to Cat’s home phone, knowing that, as long as the line was open, the answering machine would record everything.

  She tried to count off the time it would take for the call to go through, then for the phone to ring a certain number of times before the answering machine would come on, then the time it would take for Cat’s message to play before it would pick up her call.

  She was still counting when she passed out.

  Time was a word without meaning, but when she next came to, the sound of the roar had changed, as had the sense of motion. It was then she knew they’d been flying and now they were descending.

  When the motion stopped, she tried to call out, but intent never got past thought. She felt herself being dragged for what seemed like forever, and then, abruptly, everything was still.

  Before she could think, she was being unrolled. Her arms and legs were like rubber as her body was ejected into a blistering cold. The drastic change in temperature was a metaphoric slap in the face, the push she needed to open her eyes. She did, only to see someone leaning over her. In a last desperate attempt, she reached up.

  “Help me,” she whispered.

  Mark Presley had flown all the way from the airport to an oil lease he owned in East Texas without a thought in his head beyond what he still had to do. When he dragged Marsha’s body from the chopper and then started pulling it through the woods, he made himself think of what he was going to buy Penny for Christmas instead of what he had yet to do.

  He’d never killed anyone before or even imagined being in a predicament where it might be necessary. But there was no way he could have gone through with what Marsha had asked. He was too afraid of what Penny would do, should he be found out.

  By the time he got to the edge of the gully, his legs were shaking from the effort of dragging the body. He started to just toss her over, then stopped. The bright blue plastic sheeting in which she was wrapped would be too visible, especially from the air.

  Determined to do this right, he began to unroll her. She flopped out face down onto the cold, wet ground. When he gave the sheeting a last hard yank to get it out from under her, it rolled her over onto her back.

  When she suddenly opened her eyes and looked at him, reached for him, he was so shocked she was still alive that he staggered and fell backward.

  “God damn, why aren’t you dead?”

  For a few seconds they were on their backs and lying side by side. Her hair and face were soaked with blood, and yet he saw his own reflection in her eyes, saw her lips move. When he realized she was asking for help, he panicked.

  With a spurt of adrenaline born of nothing but fear, he picked her up and threw her over the rim into the tree-lined gully below. The pop and crack of the breaking limbs echoed loudly as they gave from the weight and momentum of her falling body. He was sick to his stomach and shaking in every muscle as he waited for the sound to cease.

  Finally it was over. He leaned forward and finally saw a tiny blotch of red through the trees.

  “Damn. Her coat. I should have taken it off,” he muttered, but it was too late.

  Suddenly, the enormity of what he’d done swept through him. Desperate to be gone, he turned, grabbed the blue plastic sheet and ran through the trees, back to where he’d set down. The still spinning rotors were stirring up a tornado of dust and leaves as he reached the chopper. Frantic now to get away, he ripped off his coveralls, as well as the baseball cap he’d been wearing, wrapped the clothes and the wrench, which was now a murder weapon, in the plastic sheeting, and tied them up along with a couple of nearby rocks he would need for ballast.

  When he took off, he went straight up, then headed for a nearby abandoned rock quarry holding more than forty feet of dark, murky water. He circled it once, then dropped the entire package into the middle of the quarry, circling overhead as he watched it sink. Once it was gone, he took off like a bat out of hell, bound for Dallas. He’d only gone about a half mile when he saw a small plane and recognized it as one belonging to a pipeline company in the area. They often flew the path of the buried pipelines searching for leaks, and that was obviously what they were doing today. Too late to take another course, he could do nothing but fly on, knowing full well they’d seen him.

  He’d intended to fly straight back to Dallas, but now that he’d been spotted, the only thing he could do was what he did every time he came out to his leases. He turned the chopper toward Tyler, a small town not too far away, then landed on a heli-pad often used by oil and gas companies, and started walking.

  There was a barbeque joint a couple of blocks away that he visited each time he was in the area. If this was going to be his alibi, then he didn’t dare alter his habits. Eventually someone would discover that Marsha Benton was missing, but it wasn’t going to be on his head.

  By the time he got to the restaurant, his step was lighter. This was going to work out perfectly. He had been seen flying over his own oil leases, which he did on a regular basis. And he was eating at his favorite restaurant, as he did with every visit. Nothing out of the ordinary. No one to blame.

  The owner greeted him jovially as he walked in the door, then led him straight to his favorite table. Mark ordered a slab of baby back ribs, a side order of fries and coleslaw, and cleaned his plate. He left a big tip on his credit card as he paid, then walked out. A short while later he was on his way home. The night was overcast, and the weather was already beginning to change for the worse as he landed the chopper back at the company hangar. He was home, but still not done.

  He put on another pair of gloves, got into Marsha’s car and headed for what he called the projects. Within the hour, he was circling an old housing complex. When he found a likely spot, he called a cab, asking to be picked up at The Bump and Grind, a busy, well-known nightclub with a reputation for drugs and whores, which was a few blocks over.

  He parked the car on a corner beneath a broken street light, and left the keys in the ignition and the
car unlocked. He got out without looking back and jogged to the club. Once there, and without making eye contact with the crowd around the front door, he waited for the cab to arrive.

  Luck was with him.

  Within five minutes he was being driven away. As they left the bad streets of Dallas behind him, he began to relax. He knew that Marsha’s car would be gone before morning, most likely stripped or on its way to Mexico. Even if it showed up somewhere down the road, they would never be able to link it to him.

  He rode the cab to within a half mile of the company airport, paid the driver off, then walked the rest of the way back. When he finally reached the hangar and crawled into his own car, it was close to four in the morning. His hands were shaking as he reached for his seat belt.

  It was ten minutes to five when he entered the house. He reset the security alarm before it sounded, then removed his shoes and hurried upstairs, sidestepping the family cat, who, as always, was roaming the rooms in the dark. When he finally made it into the bedroom, he was relieved to find Penny sound asleep.

  As badly as he wanted to crawl into bed beside her, he needed to maintain his alibi. When he saw how she’d curled up in a ball, he put an extra blanket over the bottom half of the bed, then hung up his clothes. Then, conscious of the continued need for an alibi, he wadded up his pajamas and messed up the sheets and his pillow as if he’d been in them all night, before hurrying into the bathroom.

  His face was drawn, his eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot as he looked at himself in the mirror. He stared at himself until he started to smile, and then he did a little jump-hop and turned the water on in the shower.